Paying Attention
by YuGiOhRox
Summary: People should really learn to pay attention more, they never know what they'll see if they do. (First chapter: Merik/Meredy x Erik : Second chapter: Gratsu/Gray x Natsu)
1. Merik

**Paying Attention**

 **Happy birthday SparklingYaoi! I was torn between ideas for this so I wrote you two little things instead of one oneshot…**

It was freezing. There were many other things about that day that Erik could note, but mostly it was just freezing. He was chilled to the bone and fairly sure icicles were forming on his skin somewhere. The only good thing about that day was the company.

One of Jellal's plans to combat the cold weather was _'oh hooray_ ' to get a fire going, nobody really had the magical power available to start one that way, so Crime Sorcière had disbanded temporarily to fetch items… at first, Erik hadn't been sure whether it was a blessing or a thorn in his side but he was stuck with Meredy searching for firewood. The first thing he'd ever say about her was 'bubbly'; she always seemed so happy on the outside and messed around playing pranks on guild members.

Of course he knew better.

Absolutely everything she did that way was a front; he didn't even _need_ his awesome hearing to know that, the signs were all over her. After spending so much time with the Oracion Seis, things like that were easy to pick up on; Meredy didn't eat much, always had small bags under her eyes, tossed and turned in her sleep and was currently incredibly tense… not that he was paying any _particular_ attention.

"You can stop staring you know; it's kind of weird Erik." Trying to tease him with a cheerful voice, blushing cheeks and staring at him cheekily, 'bubbly' was definitely the right word to describe her personality, at least the one she let everybody see. She waved her hair around, skipping, even through the cold, as if she was her own heat source, her back to him and Erik wondering just _why_ and _when_ he'd started staring in the first place.

One other thing about today was that he was incredibly glad she couldn't hear thoughts like he could. The consequences at that moment would've gone on for years knowing his guildmates.

Erik himself was never going to get over how he'd just thought she was cute.

*/*\\*

The first time they really _talked_ was a month after that day when Meredy had got everyone with water balloons; Erik had managed to dodge thanks to hearing it coming and was running through the woods with her to avoid the guildmates trying to get them.

He could've told them it was coming, but present situation aside, the opportunity had been far too good to pass up.

They must have run together for a mile or two before they stopped, adrenalin leaving their systems and any signs of their comrades left _far_ behind.

Meredy was leaning against a tree, arms hanging by her sides as she panted, chest heaving up and down and no he was _not looking_. "Well… that was fun~"

Erik was still a little too out of breath to say much, so he found himself content with just nodding; anything else seemed like too much energy anyway. When he managed to look at her, she was smiling brightly and even though it was her usual expression, it looked… off.

This was _maybe_ worth mustering up the energy for. "Hey pinkie, why do you do that all the time?"

She was pouting. Shit, that was adorable, he'd committed crimes before but something being that cute had to be illegal. "Do what? Playing pranks?"

If he wanted to do anything, it was maybe hit himself. "No, smile all the time when you don't mean it. _That's_ what I'm talking about." Her face dropped a little, looking down as shadows came over her eyes.

Had he not been a little eager for her to say why, he might have felt sorrier.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Liar."

"I'm not!"

"Liar."

"Oh, you're reading my thoughts right? Then why do you even need to ask me that?!" She looked like she wanted to start crying and he _might've_ started feeling guilty about that, but he'd been stuck with five other people with issues that he'd heard constantly. 'Wisdom came with experience' and at this point it was pretty damn obvious that talking about it made things feel better in the long run. That little piece of information he'd had far too much experience with.

"If you know that I know, and you're already riled up, it should be no problem to vent right?" Ah choices, he could gamble that Meredy wouldn't talk about a 'softer side', that _wasn't_ there, to prevent him from bringing up the conversation that made her thoughts so dark.

It was silent for a moment, and Erik shifted uncomfortably from where he was resting, a slight headache coming on as Meredy started thinking about a volcano; random but annoying, the sound of the rumbling was hurting his ears quite a bit.

"On one point your logic makes no sense, I shouldn't have to vent." True, his attempt at getting her to talk was admittedly crappy. "But on another, seeing as you really _do_ know anyway, there's no point in me trying to hide it. I could stand to get it off my chest." He kept a close eye on her as she slid down the tree, sinking to the ground and hugging her knees to her chest. "I'm not sure if Jellal ever told you – I never paid attention to that – but a former member of our guild was my adoptive mother… she left us, left me, after the incident at the Grand Magic Games. All I got was a letter and I just wish I could've seen her more time before 'her time was up', it's like in the end I didn't mean anything to her at all." Head resting on her arms, shoulders shaking and the small smell of salt, _ah crying_ … that didn't surprise him much, Erik would never claim he knew everything, it would likely make his head spin if he did, but he did know how to try and comfort someone when they were upset… perhaps at another time when she didn't want to rip his head off, he'd thank Sorano.

That thought was forgotten completely as he moved next to Meredy, bark digging into his back as an arm slung over the back of her neck to rest his fingers on her far shoulder. Erik felt straight away how she tensed and he sighed, this was going to take a while.

But maybe, just maybe, he could see that cute smile back again.

*/*\\*

It was another fortnight until Erik managed to catch her for more than a passing 'hello' or casual 'what's up?' and she looked like she was feeling a little better than when she'd talked to him in the woods. Crime Sorcière had moved location again, staying by the base of a growing dark guild on stake out before they struck. Meredy was there as they'd been put into groups; Erik was there, at the point furthest away in the 'spying set up' as it had been named, for his great listening.

Which of course never applied to just professional situations, the Second Generation Slayer was being driven a little mad with the thoughts spinning in his partner's head constantly.

"Would you calm down a little?" He hadn't meant to growl and felt a little sorry when she flinched.

"Oops, sorry." Taking deep breaths, Meredy tried breathing deeply to clear her head; the new lack of confusion and reduction of his headache helped a lot and soon they were in action against the guild.

All of it was over pretty quickly; those pathetic black wizards hadn't stood a chance against a former wizard saint and former members of the Baram Alliance. Dragging the unconscious bodies into a pile in one room, Erik had the chance to discuss things with her again.

"You seem better than you were last time I was alone with you." Speaking in hushed tones so nobody else would hear, he managed to (finally) get in a word between work.

"Well… I guess I just feel a lot better since then." She was pouting, damn it. He _still_ believed that should be illegal! The mood was sombre, to be expected when surrounded by darkness, but the feel of things just didn't sit right with him.

Coughing awkwardly behind his hand, Erik tried remembering a few jokes he'd heard before that may lighten the mood, a particular one he'd heard from the Salamander before was his first choice.

It worked brilliantly, she was on the floor in seconds, giggling uncontrollably and trying to clutch her stomach and bang her hand on the floor at the same time. Heads turned to look at the noise in what had previously been a quiet place and they were soon all thinking 'question marks', he didn't care much about the attention – though he pretended to still be hard at work – and shrugged off the questions they were mentally throwing at him.

Erik didn't care as long as she kept smiling like that.

*/*\\*

One month later and the two of them were on great terms, Meredy made friends easily and while Erik had seemed to be a little put off at the idea, he was grateful for it. She smiled a lot, laughed loudly, still played pranks only to run off with a cheeky smile gracing her face and became more herself. It was a great thing to see and he'd definitely remember it for a long time to come.

Meredy was currently teasing Jellal about Erza and some other things; the look on the guild master's face was pretty amusing, when Sorano sidled up next to him.

"So Erik, you've been hanging around little Meredy quite a bit, I've rarely seen you!" Oh hello drama queen. "How are things?" As if that would have ever fooled him, he didn't need to read her thoughts to know what she was after, it was all said plainly through the smirk on her face.

"Cut the crap, there's nothing going on between us." Breathing out a heavy sigh, he leaned back against a nearby tree and prepared for an onslaught of curious thought questions.

"Well that's not what I see, I honestly never thought things would get to the point where your ears would be more useless than seeing the obvious." Erik could humour her once in a while, but if the insults went on then he was gonna lose it… a Poison Dragon's Roar may just be headed her way eventually; that was definitely his primary thought when she continued talking, annoying questions still bouncing around in her head. "I know you well enough to see that you actually care about her and the way she looks at you is a dead giveaway on how she feels." He'd want proof; she must have known that, he'd never once been the type to accept something like that without evidence.

Sorano would've been told just that too if she hadn't started speaking again. "I can't give you much material proof, but call it a woman's intuition." Not even given the chance to retort, the self-proclaimed angel stepped away, beginning to bother racer and Hot Eye about something trivial. She even managed to shut out all of her thoughts about the conversation she'd just had with him, very clever… and actually irritating.

Any scowl he might've been wearing vanished when Meredy skipped over to him. "Hey Erik!"

"Meredy." Just nodding, he saw the expression on her face; her cheeks were puffed out and her eyes went 'chibi'… Never before had anything looked so cute.

"Awww, what's with that reply? Lame…" He could hear how much she wanted to smirk, but he'd respect that she was trying to keep her playful pout in place.

"Nothing's 'with that reply', it's just the best way to answer."

"Is not! You could've gone 'Oh hey Meredy!' or at least seemed a little more excited." She was smirking now, though it was a little impressive how she'd stopped herself from doing that before.

"I'll keep that in mind then." It looked like her eyes were sparkling, it suited her; the playful, cheeky type. Her thoughts were almost blank though, which was unusual, she must've been talking to Sorano about ways to hide important information… She might've given him a clue about that too, Meredy was starting to speak before Jellal called her back about something he needed her for.

Crap, time together was pretty short those days, work had been a pain and exhaustion was an almost constant factor in everything, but it was still always a shame watching her go.

"Hey Erik? Meet me in the woods later, there's something I want to tell you." An order; how sweet, trying to act in charge that way and leaving to help her comrade before letting him reply.

There were a few guesses to make about what 'later' was going to be, some he enjoyed, some he didn't… though the hints of a smile and a pink flush to her cheeks as she walked away may have been an indication.

Not that he was ever really paying attention.

 **I apologize for crappiness with this; these two are actually pretty hard to write… I hope the next part is better!**


	2. Gratsu

**Paying Attention**

 **Hopefully this part is better than the first, couldn't resist writing Gratsu too; though still fluff-ish…**

This was usually the time of the year he hated, memories of Ur sacrificing her life floating through Gray's mind as he recalled everything that had happened since then; joining Fairy Tail, Galuna Island, Lyon, Ultear, Silver… a lot of the time, things never seemed to go the right way for him and it sucked, but there was always one constant, a fire that burned bright enough to chase the shadows away. Damn that sounded weird, just what had his thoughts been reduced to?!

But it was true; no matter how corny it sounded it was the cold, hard truth… however bad the situation, Gray rarely felt like things could go wrong as long as Natsu was there.

…Except for that moment when the Dragon Slayer had blown up Mirajane's kitchen, he definitely wished the shadows were around so he could hide in them. Footsteps were coming down the stairs towards them and he heard the familiar sound of the She Devil's voice… things weren't looking to be very pretty, stupid Natsu!

*/*\\*

Well… Mirajane had been kinder than he'd expected. To Gray anyway, he got off with just a clip round the ear but Natsu… He almost couldn't bear to look, except at the embarrassing photos he'd taken.

Mira truly was evil sometimes; Natsu was pinned to the wall, being forced to carry everything that had been destroyed. So that included the kitchen sink, debris from the cupboards, and parts of the wall… it didn't look fun, but that was how he was treating it anyway.

"Wow Natsu, you sure got into trouble this time, I'm surprised Mira didn't rip you apart after she saw what you did!" Putting on a smirk, Gray was gonna milk this opportunity for all he was worth.

"Shut up ice princess, you were there too! If anything it's your fault for not stopping me from blowing the place up!" Replying that Natsu shouldn't have gotten to a point where he needed to be stopped shut him up for a little while.

"Look flame brain, you were the one who wanted to borrow Mira's kitchen because you ate Erza's cake and wanted to replace it before she found out, this has got nothing to do with me. And besides, Mira's not done with you yet; she's calling Erza and getting her to come over right now, so it might be a good idea to save your complaints for later…" They both went completely silent after that; Gray relaxed against what was left of Mirajane's wall, watching Natsu as the Fire Dragon Slayer's eyes went wide and his mouth go slack. With the added bonus of it being quiet, Natsu may have looked, just a little, cute.

Not that Gray was looking very closely of course.

*/*\\*

In the end, Natsu had been in the hospital for a week; his arms had given out after having to lift all the destroyed parts of Mirajane's home and Erza had been brutal. It really wasn't pretty, and the Titania was making Gray look after the Dragon Slayer to make sure nothing happened.

So far, the job hadn't been easy; Natsu really did have a big reputation for being destructive even outside of work and Gray was now stuck learning just how well his legacy spoke of him. It had only been an hour and Natsu had torn down a bakery, a fish stand, absolutely anywhere else with food and was blowing shaped flames in the sky. His hand rested on his forehead and fingers pinched the bridge of his nose as he sighed, did Natsu really have to be this much of a pain?

When the front door of a nearby house caught light, enough was enough; Gray had tried being gentle before, but this was going too far. He stormed over and picked the shorter man off his feet, dragging him away from the enclosed space after putting out the flames.

"What the hell do you think you were doing you idiot!? People could've been hurt!"

"Well _sorry_ Mr. Serious, I didn't realize there was a restriction on having fun. I thought this was a free country?" Natsu's words were slurred and as soon as Gray dropped him, he sank straight to the floor, leaving the ice wizard to blink in confusion.

What the-? It almost seemed like… but there was no way it could've happened, was there?

"Hey Natsu?" He made sure to keep his voice fairly soft in case he was right… "Can you look me in the eye for a minute?" …But he wasn't gonna wait until the crazier version of Natsu decided to listen to him, so he held his face as gently as he could, pulling the other round to make eye contact.

Damn it, he'd been right! Natsu was completely lopsided, he'd fallen face down to the floor as soon as Gray had stopped holding him and his eyes had been out of focus, glazed over and not all there. Seeing all of that only made Gray think on 'how the hell had he not noticed that before?!' and 'what happened to make this idiot drunk?!'… Both questions looked to be giving him headaches.

"You have pretty eyes, you know that." Gray blinked again, looking over to the fire user and saw that he was rolled over onto his back, splayed out everywhere and getting dirty from the ground; mud was already lightly staining his face and giving him a messier appearance than normal.

It was pretty endearing when Natsu started pouting, "Hey you're not answering me."

"Sorry, I guess I just never expected you to say that to _me_." Or anyone else for that matter, but definitely not to him.

"Well it's true, your eyes are pretty." Jumping up off of the ground, Natsu wobbled over to him; although a little disoriented from getting up so quickly. He was actually doing a decent job of trying to walk before he tripped on a rock, stumbling into Gray's arms and resting his head on his chest, warm breath puffing onto the ice wielder's bare stomach.

"Oi, Natsu, get off." His breathing was slowing down a little, but there was no way in hell Gray was going to lug the Slayer's unconscious body all the way back home. "Oh look, is that Happy at the fish stand over there!"

A flash of pink hair was all he saw for a moment as Natsu immediately perked up, head swishing round to look for his friend. "Okay he's not actually there Natsu, now come here, you can lean on me while I get you back to your place." Grumbling, the other listened to him, though Gray could tell it was reluctantly, he was letting off a dark vibe the whole trek back.

Luckily it didn't take too long to get there and all there was to do was get Natsu to drink something and get him to bed. "Hey Gray?" But of course, things were never so easy, when he found out who was responsible for getting Natsu drunk, he was going to throttle them! And he'd just been about to make his 'great escape' too… "I feel weird, can you help me?"

Gray… didn't even want to think about what Natsu had meant by that. It would've been easy, he could run away now and Natsu likely wouldn't remember anything about this by the time he was sober again. Or there was the (only slightly less desirable) option of turning back into the bedroom and finding out what Natsu wanted.

Well, to quote Elfman, he'd better man up.

…

It had just been to help clean off the dirt on his face, phew, but it had certainly been… weird; at the very least, he could say it had been weird.

" _Ugh Natsu, how'd you get so filthy? You weren't on the ground that long." And the other was too incoherent to answer at that point. Just great._

' _Armed' with a small container of water and a cloth, Gray was slowly but steadily washing away all the grime from the Dragon Slayer's skin; his hands running slowly over Natsu's cheeks, trying to clean him gently so as not to rock his head._

 _So it was a pain when Natsu kept leaning into the touch, "Hmm Gray…" It was him half-sleep talking, Gray didn't bother replying to those, he never got an answer the previous times he had done. "_ Gray! _" The fire user slumped into his arms, falling forwards from where he'd been propped upright on the bed._

 _What a pain sometimes._

" _Oh Natsu, just what am I going to do with you?" The cloth had been dropped so he could use his fingers to try and settle Natsu back into place, but Gray still brushed his thumbs lightly over Natsu's cheeks._

He couldn't believe he'd done that, if Gray was made to choose any moment in his life that was most embarrassing, he'd pick then in a heartbeat; but only mentally, nobody else was ever going to know about that.

Gray decided that he was probably going to avoid Warren for a little while.

*/*\\*

Another week later and Natsu was completely back to normal, his injuries were perfectly healed up and he was no longer drunk or suffering from a hangover. Gray had made a point to scold Cana a little when he found out she was the cause of that little episode, but he was fine laughing next to her just like everybody else. They were partying again, 'the return of Natsu Dragneel' being something to celebrate after he'd been away so long. Cana had goaded him into a drinking contest with Elfman and while he'd beat the 'real man' of Fairy Tail, he managed to avoid going any further into it with the card wizard… he didn't envy Macao and Wakaba one bit… or the people that were going to deal with _their_ hangovers when Cana drank them under the table.

Stepping away from the group hoarding the alcohol, Gray couldn't help feeling a prickling sensation on his back. He knew it wasn't Juvia, she was chatting with Lucy about something in the corner… raven hair blurred as he swivelled round, looking for the person looking at him.

What the hell…? Natsu? Natsu, was staring at him, the Dragon Slayer was standing almost perfectly still in the middle of the guild hall, apparently trying to burn a hole in his back.

It was intense… and a little uncomfortable. _Something_ had to change about that.

"Hey flame brain, you looking for a fight?" _That_ did it; Natsu was grinning like a maniac in half a second and charging at him, yelling his name as they brawled.

It was normal; right up until the moment Natsu tackled him and pushed him out the doors, running away with him.

"Oi you idiot! Let me go!"

"Nope, I've got something to do first."

"That doesn't sound too good."

"Don't worry; you'll see when we get there."

And 'there' turned out to be beautiful. The sun was setting over a clifftop, tree branches were swaying lightly with the breeze and there was a terrific view of the ocean; Gray was in total awe of everything up to the point where Natsu dumped him on the floor.

"Hey! What the hell was that for?" He didn't get an answer, so all Gray did was get back on his feet, brushing himself down and watching the horizon.

"You know Gray, you have very pretty eyes." …No way. There was no way Natsu had just said that, and especially not what he'd said when he was drunk and acting like a loon.

Stumbling over words for a while, he turned to his comrade, seeing a cheeky expression and an almost devious smirk… well that couldn't be good.

"Thinking I wouldn't remember that because I was drunk? Come on man, I have a higher tolerance than people give me credit for." Crud. If Natsu also remembered when he'd been cleaning- then just- crud!

"You should really learn to pay more attention to things like that snowflake." The comment was accompanied by another round of speechlessness as Gray felt soft lips pressing against his own. He wasn't given a chance to reciprocate the action before it was gone and his head was pulled round by Natsu's hand as the Salamander of Fairy Tail walked away from him.

And if there just so happened to be an extra swing of the hips as he walked and he looked back to give Gray another smirk, then Gray didn't notice it much. Nope. Not at all.

 **Hmm, I'm not so sure about this one either… But anyway, Happy Birthday senpai~**


End file.
